PUWER Risk Assessments In Shropshire
Work Equipment Risk Assessments
Most Shropshire businesses come to us after something has happened. An inspector asked to see the assessment and nobody could find one. A machine arrived second-hand with no manual. Someone welded a frame onto a machine to make a job easier and it never got documented.
A PUWER risk assessment checks your work equipment against the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998, machine by machine, and tells you exactly where it falls short and what has to change.
We sell inspections and assessments only. No guarding, no interlocks, no parts, no maintenance contracts. Nothing we find on your site turns into a quote for us, which is the entire point of asking someone independent to look.
Get Your FREE PUWER Assessment Quote
Tell us what equipment you have and where the site is. We aim to come back with a quote within 48 hours.
PUWER Risk Assessments In Shropshire
Work Equipment Risk Assessments
Most Shropshire businesses come to us after something has happened. An inspector asked to see the assessment and nobody could find one. A machine arrived second-hand with no manual. Someone welded a frame onto a machine to make a job easier and it never got documented.
A PUWER risk assessment checks your work equipment against the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998, machine by machine, and tells you exactly where it falls short and what has to change.
We sell inspections and assessments only. No guarding, no interlocks, no parts, no maintenance contracts. Nothing we find on your site turns into a quote for us, which is the entire point of asking someone independent to look.
Assessment, Inspection Or Thorough Examination: Which Do You Need?
Three different things get called by each other’s names, and briefing the wrong one wastes a site visit.
A PUWER risk assessment is a conformity assessment. An assessor works each machine against the regulations and records every point where it does not meet them, with a written verdict against each criterion and the control measures needed to close it. It is triggered by an event rather than a date.
A PUWER inspection is the periodic in-service check under Regulation 6, looking for deterioration on equipment already established as suitable. The result is a record, not a certificate. That is covered on our periodic PUWER inspections page.
A thorough examination has a specific legal meaning. Under LOLER it applies to lifting equipment; within PUWER it applies to power presses working cold metal and nothing else, under Regulations 32 to 35.
And a CE or UKCA plate does not settle it. Modify a machine substantially and the original Declaration of Conformity can no longer be relied on. At that point the machine has to be treated as new or re-manufactured, assessed against the Essential Health and Safety Requirements and re-marked. That single finding is the most common high-risk item we record, and it usually sits on a machine everyone assumed was fine because it came marked. On farms and in agricultural workshops it is close to universal, because equipment gets adapted to the job as a matter of course.
What Puts An Assessment On The Agenda
PUWER sets no calendar for assessments. Regulation 6 ties periodic inspection to risk rather than a fixed interval, and the only hard statutory cycle in the whole of PUWER belongs to power presses. That does not mean there is no interval. It means a competent person has to derive one from the actual risk, and that derivation is part of what the assessment gives you.
These are the situations that put an assessment on the agenda:
- Modified equipment. A guard taken off for a changeover and never refitted, a welded frame or bracket added, an implement adapted to fit a machine it was never designed for, a control retrofitted locally. The most common trigger and the biggest source of high-risk findings.
- Second-hand or auction machinery. No manual, no Declaration of Conformity, no history, and a data plate that no longer describes the machine in front of you. Farm and plant sales make this routine here.
- An enforcement visit. The HSE or your council has asked to see the assessment, or an improvement notice has landed with a date on it.
- Relocation. Equipment moved between sites or repositioned, changing access, isolation and stability.
- An insurer or customer audit. Common across the automotive, food and defence supply chains around Telford, where tier-one customers audit hard.
- A near miss or an injury. Something went wrong and the immediate question is whether the machine was compliant.
- Acquisition or a new tenancy. You have inherited a plant list you did not specify and cannot vouch for.
- New equipment before first use. Regulation 6 requires inspection after installation where safety depends on installation conditions.
If none of these apply and the equipment has been assessed before, what you probably need is periodic inspection rather than a fresh assessment. We will tell you that rather than sell you the bigger job.
Work Equipment We Assess Across Shropshire
Shropshire splits sharply in two. Telford and Wrekin is one of the most manufacturing-intensive places in the country, with manufacturing and engineering accounting for around 15.5 per cent of local jobs, more than double the national average. The rest of the county is overwhelmingly rural, with agriculture employing several times the national share of workers. The equipment list changes completely depending on which side of that line you are on.
Advanced manufacturing and precision engineering. A cluster of tier-one and tier-two automotive and precision engineering firms around Telford. Press shops, CNC machining centres, injection moulding, robot cells, welding equipment and surface finishing plant.
Food and drink manufacturing. A serious sector here, from sauces and ready meals through to poultry and meat processing. Filling and packaging lines, palletisers, wrappers, CIP systems, band saws, mincers and cold-store handling equipment.
Agriculture and agricultural engineering. Tractors, PTO-driven implements, balers, mixer wagons, augers, grain dryers, handling equipment and the workshops that maintain them. This is work equipment like any other, and it is where the mobile plant regulations do real work.
Logistics and distribution. The M54 corridor and the Telford estates. Dock levellers, balers, conveyors, racking and lift trucks.
Quarrying and construction materials. Extraction and processing across the county, bringing crushers, screens, conveyor runs and mobile plant into scope.
Defence and aerospace. A growing presence around Telford with the precision machining, test and handling equipment that comes with it.
If your equipment is not on that list, it does not mean it falls outside PUWER. The definition is deliberately wide: any machinery, appliance, apparatus, tool or installation used at work, including equipment you hire rather than own.
GSB Inspection Services
Covering Both Shropshire Authorities, And Who Enforces Where
Shropshire is two councils, and neither of them is a county council. Shropshire Council has been a unitary authority since 1 April 2009, when the old county council and its six districts were abolished and merged into one. Telford and Wrekin Council became a separate unitary authority back in 1998 and administers the borough independently. Both sit within the ceremonial county, which has a combined population of a little over 528,000.
That is worth knowing, because Shropshire is one of the places where the current round of local government reorganisation largely passes by. The programme that is replacing the ten councils in Staffordshire and the ten in Derbyshire with two unitary authorities apiece exists to dismantle two-tier structures. Shropshire dismantled its own in 2009. There are ongoing discussions about a wider strategic authority and an elected mayor covering the region, and Telford and Wrekin has been publicly resistant to any merger, but nothing has been confirmed. For the moment your council is the one you already deal with.
Which body enforces PUWER, though, depends on your main activity rather than your address. Under the Health and Safety (Enforcing Authority) Regulations 1998, the HSE is generally the enforcing authority for factories, manufacturing, construction, quarries and agriculture. The local authority takes warehousing and wholesale distribution, retail, offices, hotels and catering, and leisure.
In a county this sharply divided that split matters. The manufacturing base around Telford and the farms across the rest of the county are both HSE territory, despite having almost nothing else in common. The distribution sheds on the same estates as the factories are enforced by the council, whose environmental health team holds exactly the same powers to serve improvement and prohibition notices as an HSE inspector.
We cover both authorities and we are not a national call centre routing you to whoever is nearest.
What Happens When Our Assessor Is On Site
Most of the work is on the machines, but the visit starts before that and the paperwork side matters as much as the hardware.
1
Pre-assessment with your duty holder.
Done jointly with whoever holds health and safety responsibility, before anything is surveyed. We agree the scope and confirm exactly which items are in it, then review the systems around them: your policy and responsibilities, operational procedures and equipment manuals, training records, accident history relevant to the equipment, previous examination and inspection reports, and maintenance logs. Having those ready makes the day considerably shorter.
2
The physical survey.
Each machine is worked through against the criteria that apply to it, with the operator wherever possible, because how a machine is actually used is rarely how the manual says it is used. Expect questions about changeovers, cleaning and clearing blockages, since that is where most real risk lives. Machines need to be stopped and safely isolated for the guarding, interlock and isolation checks.
3
If the assessor finds something that means a machine should come out of use immediately, you hear it on the day, in person, not when the report lands. Findings are photographed as they are recorded so the person who has to fix it can see exactly what the assessor saw.
4
The report per machine.
One report for each item, so each can be actioned, filed and revisited on its own. Equipment details, the assessment matrix with a verdict against every criterion, a scored risk assessment, the control measures needed, the residual risk once they are in, a recommended inspection periodicity and the photographic annex.
Why Shropshire Businesses Choose GSB
A PUWER assessment produces a list of things that are wrong with your machinery. It is worth thinking about who is holding the pen.
We have nothing to sell you off the back of it. Most firms offering assessments also sell guarding, interlocks, safety relays, light curtains, retrofits, training or maintenance contracts. Their assessment is the survey that precedes their quote. Not necessarily dishonest, but not independent either, and an inspector reading the report knows it. GSB sells inspections and assessments. That is the whole product.
Competence you can point to. We are an associate member of the Safety Assessment Federation and work to the competency standards and code of practice it sets. Our engineers are professionally registered with the Engineering Council or working towards registration. For a service whose entire value rests on the competence and independence of the assessor, external verification of both is worth having.
We assess mobile plant properly. On a great many sites Regulations 25 to 30 get recorded as not applicable and forgotten. Across rural Shropshire they are often the most important part of the assessment: rollover protection, restraint, self-propelled equipment, remote controls and drive shafts. Guarding a power take-off shaft is a Regulation 30 duty in its own right, and it is one of the findings we see most often on farm and contractor equipment.
You speak to senior people. No brokers, no call centre, no being passed between departments. The business is run by its two directors, both senior engineers, and enquiries reach them. A technical question about whether something falls under PUWER, LOLER or PSSR gets answered on the call rather than in a follow-up.
PUWER Risk Assessments In Shropshire
An assessment is not a walk round with a clipboard. Every machine is worked through against a fixed set of criteria, each tied to the regulation it comes from, and each gets a written verdict rather than a tick. The regulations divide into three groups for assessment purposes:
- Regulations 4 to 10, management issues – suitability, maintenance, inspection, specific risks, information and instructions, training, and conformity with product legislation.
- Regulations 11 to 24, physical aspects – dangerous parts and guarding, specified hazards, temperature, controls and control systems, stop and emergency stop, isolation of energy, stability, lighting, maintenance operations, markings and warnings.
- Regulations 25 to 30, mobile plant – carrying employees, rollover and overturn protection, self-propelled equipment, remote controls and drive shafts. On agricultural and contractor equipment this is often the section that matters most.
Each criterion comes back as Satisfactory, Conditionally Satisfactory or Unsatisfactory, with a separate yes or no on whether action is required. Items that pass are recorded as passing, because an assessment that only lists problems is not evidence of anything.
Alongside that sits a scored risk assessment: likelihood against severity on a three by three matrix, with severity anchored to major injury as defined in RIDDOR. Scores of 7 to 9 are High and need urgent action, 4 to 6 Medium, 1 to 3 Low. Persons at risk are recorded separately for employees, visitors, contractors and the public, because the answer often differs between them.
Critically, every hazard also carries a residual risk rating showing where it lands once the recommended controls are in place. That is the column that turns a list of problems into a plan, and it is the one most reports in this market leave out.
Where equipment falls under another regime we say so rather than quietly duplicating it. Lifting parts attract a LOLER thorough examination, pressure systems need a written scheme of examination under PSSR, extraction needs LEV testing under COSHH, and access at height brings in the Work at Height Regulations. Where those examinations already cover the significant risks they can satisfy the Regulation 6 duty for that item, so there is no sense paying twice.
Our Commitment To Your Safety
We Are A Proud Associate Member Of The Safety Assessment Federation (SAFed)
As an associate member of the Safety Assessment Federation (SAFed), GSB Inspections works to the competency standards and code of practice SAFed sets for inspection bodies. For a PUWER assessment that matters in a particular way: the value of the report rests entirely on the competence and independence of the person who wrote it, and SAFed membership is one of the few external checks on both.
How To Book A PUWER Assessment In Shropshire
Six steps. Only one of them needs your production to pause, briefly, and only for the machines being assessed.
1
Send an equipment list
Email info@gsbinspections.co.uk or use the enquiry form on this page. A plant list or asset register is ideal; a spreadsheet of machine names and locations is enough to start. Photographs of anything home-built, heavily modified or bought second-hand help more than a description does. Tell us if an inspector or auditor has already set a date.
2
Receive a quote
We come back with a price, usually within 48 hours, based on the equipment and the site rather than on what we expect to find. If your list includes items already covered by another statutory examination you hold, we will say so and take them out rather than charge you to duplicate it.
3
Confirm a date
Machines have to be stopped and safely isolated for parts of the assessment, so we work around shutdowns, planned maintenance windows, out of hours and weekends. On farms and contracting businesses we can work around seasonal peaks, which usually means assessing outside the harvest and silage windows rather than during them.
4
Before the visit we work through the legislation, standards and industry guidance that apply to your process and equipment, and identify what good looks like for each item. Any risk assessments you have had done before are taken into account, including whether the recommendations from them were ever acted on.
5
The assessment and the report
The pre-assessment and physical survey happen on site, then you receive one report per machine: equipment details, the criteria matrix, the scored risk assessment, control measures, residual risk, recommended inspection periodicity and photographs of the findings.
6
What happens after
The report is a preliminary risk assessment for identifying the measures needed to comply. It is for you to consider internally and build your own final risk assessments from, which is how the duty sits under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999. Once the action plan is closed out we can reassess the remediated items so the record shows the loop was closed, and most sites then move onto periodic Regulation 6 inspections at the interval the report recommends.
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Client Satisfaction
Gary has been doing MPi ltd's lifting certifications, air compressor tank and roller shutter door inspections for a number of years now. I have always found him a pleasure to... read more
matt page
Excellent service very competent knowledgeable and professional staff Would highly recommend
Carl Eades
Well what a great service Gary provides, always does a very thorough job, can't recommend enough, we always Gary really great guy.
Daz Griffiths
Excellent service & communications
Gary Jackson
Service, communication, support and advice has been excellent, Garry has gone out of his way to support our school with issues arisen from council maintenance, he has gone out of... read more
Miss H Morrey
Inspected transferable winch units with, greatly appreciated, additional guidance covering separate requirements for accompanying D shackles and inspection schedule. Very diligent service and great value.
Andrew Piekarczyk
Prompt and professional friendly service.
Apples & Pears Nursery
Great service. Would highly recommend and will use again.
Jade Furey
Excellent service, very thorough and practical
Kerry Callear
Great bloke, reliable, informative, pleasure to deal with.
Gary Jackson
My first contact was with Gary and he dealt with my query and questions brilliantly. He explained the process, it was easy to sort and it went smoothly. Expected contact... read more
Mrs B
Been using GSB for a year, great service keeping all our plant and machinery in certification
James Plant
Gary has been doing our certifications for the last few years. Very professional and very reliable. A**
Rob Scanlan
Useful Shropshire Resources
Website: shropshire.gov.uk
The unitary authority for the county outside Telford and Wrekin, covering everything from highways to environmental health. Its environmental health team is the enforcing authority for warehousing, retail, offices, hotels and catering, and leisure premises in its area.
Website: telford.gov.uk
A separate unitary authority since 1998, administering the borough independently of Shropshire Council. Same enforcement split applies within its boundary, and its environmental health team holds the same powers to serve improvement and prohibition notices as an HSE inspector.
Website: hse.gov.uk/work-equipment-machinery/puwer.htm
The HSE hub for PUWER: overview, inspection and maintenance of work equipment, training and competence, and mobile work equipment. The HSE enforces in factories, manufacturing, construction, quarries and agriculture, which covers both halves of the Shropshire economy.
The regulations and the ACOP
PUWER 1998: legislation.gov.uk
ACOP L22: hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/l22.htm
The regulations themselves, and the Approved Code of Practice assessments are carried out against. L22 carries special legal status: follow it and you are taken to have complied, or show your alternative is at least as good.
Frequently asked questions
A conformity assessment of your work equipment against the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998. An assessor works through each machine, records every point where it does not meet the requirements, references the finding to the regulation it breaches, and grades it. The output is a report and an action plan, not a pass or a fail.
No, and it is the most common mix-up in this market. An assessment establishes whether a machine complies in the first place and is triggered by an event: a purchase, a modification, a relocation, an enforcement visit. An inspection is the periodic in-service check required by Regulation 6, looking for deterioration on equipment already established as suitable. Most sites need both, at different points.
PUWER sets no frequency for assessments. Regulation 6 ties periodic inspection to risk rather than a fixed interval, justified by the equipment, its use and its environment. In practice an assessment is repeated when something changes: the machine is modified, moved, used for a different job, or the existing assessment no longer reflects what is on the floor. Each report we issue recommends inspection periodicities for the items it covers.
A competent person. The Approved Code of Practice defines that as someone with sufficient knowledge and experience to know what to look at, what to look for, and what to do about what they find. There is no single mandatory qualification, which is a genuine source of confusion. What matters is demonstrable knowledge of the equipment, the hazards, the regulations and current safeguarding standards. The employer can delegate the work but never the accountability.
No. PUWER creates no certificate, no expiry date and no document to display. Anyone offering to issue you a PUWER certificate is selling something the regulations do not contain. What the regulations require is that inspection results are recorded and kept available, so the evidence takes the form of reports and records rather than a certificate.
No. A mark records that the manufacturer declared conformity with supply law for the use they intended. PUWER asks whether the machine is safe for the task you are actually doing, in your environment, with your people. New marked machinery fails assessments regularly, usually because it was installed differently to the manual, guarded for a different feed method, or integrated into a line the manufacturer never saw. Substantial modification can invalidate the original Declaration of Conformity entirely.
It depends on the main activity at the site, not the postcode. The HSE is generally the enforcing authority for factories, manufacturing, construction, quarries and agriculture, which covers both the Telford manufacturing base and the farms across the rest of the county. Shropshire Council or Telford and Wrekin Council takes warehousing and wholesale distribution, retail, offices, hotels and catering, and leisure. Two units on the same estate can have different enforcing authorities, and both hold the same powers to serve improvement and prohibition notices.
Not in the same way. The current reorganisation programme exists to replace two-tier county and district structures with unitary authorities. Shropshire already did that in 2009, when the county council and its six districts merged into a single unitary, and Telford and Wrekin has been a separate unitary since 1998. There are continuing discussions about a wider strategic authority and an elected mayor for the region, and Telford and Wrekin has publicly opposed any merger, but nothing has been confirmed. In practical terms your enforcing authority is the one you already deal with.
Almost anything used at work. The definition covers any machinery, appliance, apparatus, tool or installation for use at work, from a hand drill to a production line, including equipment hired rather than owned and equipment an employee brings from home. Use is defined just as widely, taking in starting, stopping, programming, setting, transporting, repairing, modifying, maintaining, servicing and cleaning.
Tell us when you enquire, including the date you have been given. It changes how we sequence the visit and what the report needs to demonstrate. Not having an assessment is a gap you can close; what makes it worse is closing it with a document that will not stand up when read. Send the equipment list to info@gsbinspections.co.uk and mention the notice.
Yes, fully. Tractors, PTO-driven implements, balers, mixer wagons, augers, grain dryers and handling equipment are all work equipment, and agriculture is HSE-enforced. Regulations 25 to 30 cover mobile work equipment specifically, and on farms they do real work rather than being recorded as not applicable: rollover protection, restraint, self-propelled equipment, remote controls and drive shafts. Regulation 30 requires drive shafts to be guarded, which on a power take-off shaft means the guard has to be present, complete and secured against rotation, not just nominally fitted.
Usually yes, but not for the same parts of the machine. LOLER covers the lifting parts; PUWER covers everything else about that equipment, plus everything that does no lifting at all. A telehandler is the classic case here: the lifting mechanism and attachments under LOLER, the brakes, steering, restraint, guarding and controls under PUWER. Where an examination under LOLER, PSSR or another regime already covers the significant risks for an item, it can satisfy the Regulation 6 duty for that item.
Yes, for the parts involving guarding, isolation, controls and interlock function, and for anything needing safe access. It is usually a short period per machine rather than a day, and it can be spread across a shutdown, a maintenance window or out of hours. Tell us your constraints at quote stage and we will build the visit around them.
Yes, and it is one of the most common reasons for an assessment. The absence of a manual and a Declaration of Conformity is itself a finding, and it changes how the assessor has to approach the machine because intended use cannot be assumed. Photographs sent in advance help, particularly of guarding, controls and any modifications. Machinery bought at farm and plant sales is very often in exactly this position.
Regulation 5 is maintenance: keeping equipment in efficient working order and good repair. Regulation 6 is inspection: a planned, safety-critical check by a competent person, recorded separately. They are distinct duties and this is a recurring enforcement finding. A combined service log recording lubrication, oil changes and reactive repairs does not evidence Regulation 6, however well the machine is actually maintained.
Likelihood against severity on a three by three matrix. Severity runs from minor injuries through injuries causing time off work to major injury or death as defined in RIDDOR. That produces a score: 7 to 9 High and needing urgent action, 4 to 6 Medium, 1 to 3 Low. Persons at risk are recorded separately for employees, visitors, contractors and the public. Every hazard also carries a residual rating showing where it lands once the recommended controls are in.
No, and it is worth being straight about that. What we carry out is a preliminary risk assessment for the purpose of identifying the measures needed to comply with PUWER. The content is for you to consider internally and use to form your own final risk assessments, which is how the duty sits under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999. It gives you the technical evidence base and the action plan; the risk assessment itself remains the employer’s.
GSB Inspection Services
PUWER Assessment Service Areas In Shropshire
This is not an exhaustive list. We carry out PUWER risk assessments across the whole of Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin, and we are constantly expanding our reach. If your site sits outside these areas, send us your equipment list and we will tell you plainly whether we can cover it.
- Shrewsbury
- Telford
- Oswestry
- Bridgnorth
- Ludlow
- Market Drayton
- Whitchurch
- Newport
- Wem
- Shifnal
- Church Stretton
- Craven Arms
- Broseley
- Much Wenlock
Require A PUWER Risk Assessment In Shropshire?
No brokers, no call centre, and nothing to sell you off the back of what we find.
Send your equipment list and site location using the form below, or email info@gsbinspections.co.uk. We aim to come back with a quote within 48 hours. If an inspector or auditor has already set you a date, say so in the message.
info@gsbinspections.co.uk
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